This site has been established to discover
details about the life of Carl Hau (sometimes, probably
orignially, spelled Karl Hau), a citizen of Germany and
the United States. He was born in the village of
Grosslittgen (some sources say he was born in Bernkastel
- since 1905 Bernkastel-Kues) Germany and held a law
degree from George Washington University in Washington,
D.C. and was an instructor in the law school there, an
expert in Roman law. He was the defendant in one of
Germany's most famous murder trials in 1907. He was
accused, and later convicted, of the murder of his
mother-in-law, Josephine Molitor (nee Josephine
Stadelhofer) on November 6, 1906 in Baden-Baden, Germany.
Click here for more
information about Josephine Molitor and her two
daughters, Olga Molitor and Lina Hau (nee Molitor).

Before the trial, which took place in 1907,
Carl Hau's wife, Lina, committed suicide. Public opinion
in Germany was unusually passionate in this case and
there were large demonstrations during and after the
trial in Karlsruhe which required the military to
intervene. Hau was found guilty due to circumstantial
evidence and was sentenced to death. This happened
despite the fact that several eyewitnesses and
individuals who were near the scene presented evidence
that Hau could not have been the murderer. Later his
sentence was reduced to life imprisonment.

Many observers saw the case as a terrible
example of a flawed justice system, as well as misconduct
by the presiding judge, Dr. Eller and the District
Attorney, Dr. Bleicher. Key witnesses were not allowed to
testify and the jurors discussed the case freely with
local townspeople in the evenings during the trial. Most
likely the jurors felt Hau must be guilty because of
unsavory aspects of his life that came out during the
trial. Nonetheless, when he was found guilty, many people
felt that the trial itself was a sham. (At that time in
Germany, the legal system in some parts of the country -
including Baden Baden - did not conform to federal legal
standards. That was changed in 1918, due in part to the
Hau trial.) Moreover, Josephine Molitor's heart was
displayed in the courtroom. It stood on a table in front
of the judge, preserved in alcohol and kept in a glass
jar so that everyone could see it.

Carl Hau remained in prison until 1924 (his
sentence had been shorted earlier) when he was released
on parole. This was a year earlier than would otherwise
have been the end of his sentence. A condition of this
"early release" was that he would not publish
anything about the case, probably because the authorities
did not want more unfavorable publicity about the trial.
During the time Hau was in prison, there were numerous
books and articles written on this topic and the
authorities knew that Hau himself had been writing
extensively on the topic while in prison.

Immediately, steps were taken to put him
back in prison. He fled to Italy, possibly because he
believed the Italian police would be less diligent in
searching for him than the police of other countries. In
1926, Carl Hau died in Tivoli, Italy. It seems likely
that he committed suicide.

Carl Hau, sometime in the 1920s
(Photo courtesy of Thomas Kugler)

A great many books and articles
have been written about this case, mostly during the
first half of the 20th Century. At least 2 movies had
been made based on the case, one in 1925 and one in 1949.

If you have any information to share - or
would like to see some of the information collected by me
- please contact me at this Email Contact. It would be
helpful if you placed the words "Carl Hau" in
the subject line. Unfortunately, I do not speak German. I
have also created an Email discussion group on the topic
of Carl Hau and the Molitor family at http://groups-beta.google.com/group/carlhau?hl=en

Why am I so interested in this case? The
reason is simple: Carl Hau was my grandfather, Lina Hau
my grandmother and Josephine Molitor my
great-grandmother. My mother, born in Washington, D.C. in
1903 was the only child of Carl and Lina Hau. She was
originally named Olga Hau (Olga after the first name of
her aunt) but her name was changed to Ruth Dorothee
Masters after the trial because before she died, Lina had
requested it - presumably to protect her from the vast
amount of publicity the case generated. Her name, after
she married my father in 1932, became Ruth Dorothee
Masters Rickover. I am Robert Masters Rickover, her son.
It was several years after her death in 1972 that I
learned about Carl Hau and the Molitor family and I'm
interested in finding out more.

Among the areas I'd like to know more about:

1. Any material that would shed light on
Hau's guilt or innocence. It seems likely to me now that
he was guilty, but I am not totally sure.

2. Information about Carl and Lina Hau's
life in Washington, D.C.

3. Information about what happened Lina's
sister, Olga Molitor, the "other woman" in the
relationship between Carl and Lina. Also, information
about Carl Molitor, Lina and Olga's brother and about
decendents of the Hau and Molitor families.

4. The
Generallandesarchiv, an archive in Karlsruhe has an
extensive collection of documents about the case. Any
help in gaining access to those documents would be much
appreciated.

5. Information about the Platenius family who adopted my mother in 1911 and then moved - apparantly briefly - to the United States. I know my mother was living in Germany during World War I and went to university there before moving back to the United States in 1925. In the book Hau by Bernd Schroeder (see below) he provides information about her adoption and the notification of Carl Hau - pages 292 and 293.

In addition, I would very much appreciate
any help with translating German documents into English -
or even providing short English summaries. Like so many
Americans, my foreign language skills were never well
developed!

l

***

I have made English translations of Carl
Hau's two books as well as some other material published
about the case which I am happy to share. I plan to add
other references to this site over time.

Berend Blocker has created a website that contains information in German and photos relating to the Carl Hau case. Here are the pages of a recent article about the Hau case by him: Magazine Cover - Page 1 - Page 2 - Page 3

Karl Hau und Die Emordung Der Frau
Josefine Molitor (Karl Hau and the Murder of Josephine
Molitor) by Paul Lindau, Berlin, H. Hoffman and
Comp., 1907. This book was written a few months after the
trial. "One thing is clear..seldom has there been a
trial in which the most important facts remained so
unexplained..", Lindau wrote. Like many others who
have written about the subject, he concludes that while
Carl Hau had some deep personal faults, he could not have
been guilty of the murder. Click here to read an English
translation and the full German text

On the Resumption of Hau's Trial: The
'Gray-bearded Man' behind the Molitor Women on November
6, 1906, and my Challenge to the District Attorney Dr.
Bleicher to a Duel with Pistols by Baron von
Reitzenstein, retired Army captain. (I have this only in
English translation. The date of publication appears to
be 1908.) This has to be one of the most bizarre
documents to come out of the Hau case. The Baron's wife,
Baroness von Reitzenstein, was a key witness in the case.
Her testimony, if heard in full by the jurors, would have
cast serious doubt on Hau's possible guilt. Because of
the way the District Attorney used only parts of her
testimony and implied she was mistaken in the rest, the
Baron challenged him to a duel. The challenge was
rejected, and Reitzenstein was imprisoned for one month
for violating the prohibition against dueling. Because of
his military status, he spent that time in very
comfortable surroundings in an army fort. He makes an
impassioned plea to re-open the case, based on the
testimony of his wife, as well as other eyewitness
accounts. Click here to read
an English translation

The Maurizius Case by Jacob
Wasserman, Carroll & Graf Publishers, New York, 1985
(originally published in 1929). A novel based loosely on
the Hau case, Wasserman is clearly of the belief that Hau
was wrongly convicted.

Maurizius Forever by Henry Miller,
Fridtzof-Karla Publications, Michigan City, Indiana,
1959. Henry Miller uses the Wasserman novel as a starting
point and goes on to a far-reaching analysis of crime.

Der Kriminalroman ("The Crime
Novel"), by Alfred Lichtenstein. A literary and
forensic-medical study. With an appendix: "Sherlock
Holmes on the Hau case." Edited, and with an
afterward by Oliver Bruhns. This study, originally
published in 1908, is one of the earliest broader
analyses of the mystery genre, focusing on Poe, Conan
Doyle and many of their fellow authors. In the appendix,
Lichtenstein makes Sherlock Holmes investigate the case
of Carl Hau. The afterward by Oliver Bruhns takes a
closer look at the Hau case, providing a good overview on
the whole case and the consequences it had for Germany's
legal system. (Published in 1998 by the German Sherlock
Holmes Society "Von Herder Airguns Ltd." in
conjunction with Baskerville
Buecher, Cologne, and can be ordered from that firm.)

I Swear by the witness Lenk (I have
this only in English translation) Lenk was Carl Hau's
cellmate while Hau was awaiting trial. The authorities
tried to get Lenk to testify against Hau, based on their
conversations in jail, but Lenk refused as he was
absolutely convinced of Hau's innocence. I Swear may be
part of the official court record in the case - I'm not
sure. Lenk's final sentence reads: "Carl Hau is no
murderer!" Click here to read an English
translation

Schutz von der
Justiz! - Apparently an appeal for justice on Carl
Hau's behalf. I don't have an English translation.

A great many addlitional New York Times articles in pdf format concerning the case can be found here They deal with Carl Hau's arrest, the trial, conflicting testimony, appeals, attempt as escape from prision and much more.

Der Fall Arbogast, by Thomas
Hettche, purlished by DuMont Buchverlaag, Germany in 2001
is a novel that contains some parallels to the Carl Hau
case. Indeed, it references the Hau case (pages 92-96 of The
Arbogast Case, an English translation published by
Farrar, Straus and Giroux in 2003) and provides some
historical information about the prison at Bruchsal where
Carl Hau was incarcerated for 17 years. As the book
states: " It was modeled on the Pentonville
Penitertiary outside of London. It was the first prison
on the Continent constructed according to the principle
of the panopticon - a sanitary and finely tuned
machine......It was the first prison in Germany to
introduce the incarceration of prisoners in individual
cells...Bruchsal was the model of which all subsequent
German prisons were constructed...The prisoner was kept
in his cell at all times. He not only slept there but ate
there and worked there, too. When he left his cell to
attend church or went into the courtyard, he wore a mask
that rendered him unrecognizable to others, and he was
not permitted to speak on the way there. As for the time
a prisoner spent in the courtyard, he was still kept
isolated - in a small wedge-shaped walled compartment of
a larger circular courtyard...In church, the prisoners
sat in separate enclosed seats, which were referred to as
'stalls' and allowed only a direct view of the
pulpit." (page 51 - 53).